Monday, March 1, 2010

Captain America #603, Dark Wolverine #83 & Dark X-Men #4

Wow, it's already the first day of March... Nothing too exciting going on with me, I ordered a bunch of comics I didn't need earlier today, comics I probably won't get around to reading for months, but what else is new? Oh yeah, in other comic book related news, it seems Superman has already been dethroned... Who took his place? Why Batman of course! Since I'm going to bet most of you have NO idea what I'm babbling about, click here and all will be revealed to you. I'll be checking out a couple of my favorite Marvel comics tonight, but fear not DC faithful, over at my other blog(which you can conveniently find here)I'll be starting Wonder Woman week up. All right, enough talk, let's get to the reviews! Now with extra X-Man!

Captain America #603: Writer: Ed Brubaker. Pencils: Luke Ross.

We open by reliving some of the life of Bad Cap, and get into what's bothering him about America(it's not the 1950's anymore!). Bad Cap gets updated by some of his Watchdogs as to how Bucky's training is progressing, and the Watchdogs tell Bad Cap that it seems Bucky is deliberately trying to downplay his skills, which just confirms Bucky's identity to Bad Cap. We get a quick scene showing Bucky and Falcon attacking a few of the Watchdogs(I guess so we know Falcon is still hanging around)before we head back to Bucky's Watchdog training sessions. Bucky decides to make his move late one night, and he sneaks into Bad Cap's command tent in order to try to figure out what Bad Cap's plan was, but he is surprised to find Bad Cap standing there waiting for him. Bucky attacks and trounces Bad Cap, which causes Bucky to realize that he wasn't fighting the real Bad Cap, just a lookalike. Bucky figures out that Bad Cap must be after Falcon, and rushes out of the tent, only to be met by at least 50 Watchdogs training their guns on him. Falcon is returning to his hotel room, when he is confronted by several Watchdogs, which causes him to try to take the fight outside. Before getting outside, Falcon runs into Bad Cap, who pretty much beats the living hell out of Falcon, leaving him lying in the street. This issue ends with one of the Watchdogs, a scientist, telling Bad Cap that they should return Falcon to their base so they could remove the Vibranium from Falcon's wing systems, which they could then use to create a devastatingly powerful bomb.

This was a pretty good comic. The story is moving along at a brisk pace, and we now know what Bad Cap's plan is(creating a mega-powerful Vibranium bomb). This was definitely a set-up issue, but it does a good job of making Bad Cap and his Watchdogs look very strong, setting up for what should be an explosive confrontation between Bad Cap and Bucky down the road.

Score: 8 1/2 out of 10.How can't you like a character whose idea of a battle plan is, "Rush in and get captured."?

Dark Wolverine #83: Writers: Daniel Way & Marjorie Liu. Pencils: Giuseppe Camuncoli.

This issue picks up directly where last issue left off, with Daken killing Norman Osborn during the Siege of Asgard. Daken taunts Osborn's corpse for a while, before he is interrupted by three strange women who claim to be Asgardian Fates. The Fates tell Daken that he really hadn't killed Osborn, he had only imagined it, which is what drew them to him. They then talk cryptically and disappear, leaving Daken standing next to the alive and well Osborn feeling pretty confused... Oh boy, it's going to be one of THOSE comics... Osborn gets annoyed by Daken's inattention and sends him to hunt down Thor as a punishment. Daken finds Thor, and before anything can happen, he is pulled out of reality by the Fates, who explain that they want to create Ragnarok, and that they feel Daken is the human who would be able to cause that event to occur. Daken gets pissed that the Fates are trying to use him to do their bidding, and he warns them that if he was to bring about Ragnarok, it would be on his terms, not theirs. Upset by Daken, the Fates disappear, and Daken gets sent back to his body, which had been charbroiled by Thor's lightning. As Daken regains consciousness, he spots Osborn flying around in the sky above him, which angers Daken. This issue ends with the Fates, who are still miffed about Daken's actions towards them, deciding to punish Daken by forcing him to live through his greatest fear.

Well, the streak is over! The last two issues of Dark Wolverine had gotten 10 out of 10's from me, and although this issue was good, it certainly wasn't a perfect comic book. I'm obviously not surprised that Daken imagined killing Osborn, because like I said last issue, there is NO way Marvel was going to kill Osborn off in an issue of Dark Wolverine. When and if Osborn goes, it will be in the main Siege mini-series, not an x-over issue. Although not perfect anymore, I'd still consider this series among Marvel's best titles, hands down.

Score: 8 out of 10.Yeah, I've said it before, but I think I should say it again, Daken is one hell of a great character.

Dark X-Men #4(of 5): Writer: Paul Cornell. Pencils: Leonard Kirk.

This issue begins with Nate Grey(who is currently in possession of Norman Osborn's body)telling Mystique that he wouldn't be bowing down to her demands. Nate tells Mystique that he'd consider helping her remove the bomb Osborn implanted in her head only if she proved herself to him by redeeming herself. While the two are talking, Osborn momentarily regains control of his body, but is swiftly replaced by Nate. Nate explains that he has a lot of work ahead of him as he decides that he is going to try to right all of Osborn's wrongs, and as such, he tells Mystique that if she were to run away, he wouldn't try to stop her. Instead of running away, Mystique decides to alert her fellow Dark X-Men as to what has transpired, and they all begin to panic at the prospect of Nate controlling things. Ultimately, Mystique calms them down long enough for her to reveal her plan to them. What is that plan? I'll get back to that in a bit. We next go inside the mind of Norman Osborn, where he and Nate are having an arm wrestling contest to determine who would take control of Osborn's body... Yeah, really! Osborn explains to Nate that he doesn't need to defeat him, only stalemate him long enough for somebody to figure out what had happened, so that one of Osborn's many colleagues could eject Nate from his brain. While that is going on, Mystique and the Dark X-Men head to the Psi-division of HAMMER and with the help of one of HAMMER's telepaths, the Dark X-Men enter the astral plane in search of Osborn's mind. Back in Osborn's mind, Osborn begins to get the upper-hand on Nate, but surprisingly, Nate doesn't seem at all bothered by that, in fact, he informs Osborn that everything was going exactly as he had planned... The Dark X-Men find Osborn's mind, and arrive in a large dungeon, which is where they assume Nate had trapped Osborn's consciousness. Osborn begins to panic, as he realizes where the Dark X-Men were, and Nate takes advantage of Osborn's panic by pressing his attack. This issue ends with the Dark X-Men breaking open a large locked door in Osborn's mind revealing his Green Goblin persona!

Yet another very good comic book! I've been pretty lucky with the books I've been reading as of late! This issue was a little bit more comedic then the last three issues(Nate and Osborn arm wrestling to see who would have control of Osborn's body?!?), but that didn't take away from the story at all. All of the important characters(Nate, Osborn, Mystique and Dark Beast)were all acting perfectly in character, which is always a major plus, and the art and story blended together nicely. All in all, I have no major complaints. Now, with only one more issue left, I have to wonder what will become of my favorite character upon the end of this mini-series... As of right now, I'm going to guess that Nate gets ejected from Osborn's mind, and ends up returning to the astral plane as dissipated energy again. If that were to happen, I can't say I'd be overly disappointed, because if Nate was able to return to life once from that state, there's no reason to believe he wouldn't be able to do it again. In a perfect world, this mini would end with Nate leaving Osborn's body, creating a new body for himself and leaving with the Dark X-Men, although with Mystique's actions this issue, I think that would be a bit of a stretch. Regardless of what happens here, I can at least be happy with the fact that for at least 5 issues, Nate Grey was alive and kicking ass again, which is all I ever really wanted...

Score: 8 1/2 out of 10.You know, I'm really going to miss this mini-series when it ends... Where else can I read about Norman Osborn and Nate Grey having an arm wrestling contest?

23 comments:

  1. Move over Supes, The Dark Knight is coming through. Man, I need to go buy one of those comics from an old man who has no idea what their worth... And looks like a nice Haul from Marvel, glad you see X-Man hasn't been Todd'd yet

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  2. Wouldn't that just be great if you helped some old guy clean out his basement or something and he gave you a box full of really old comics he found?

    Yeah, so far so good with Nate, but things were really good for Jason Todd in the beginning too!

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  3. Man I'd love that, I need to go befriend a few old people now that you say that...

    Good point but at least your dude is like heading his own comic series, I didn't even get that. :( Lol

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  4. Ha! I'm not sure it's worth it JT... Do you know how many old folks you'd have to get through before hitting the jackpot?

    Yeah, I guess you have a point there. But at least Jason is still around, right? Oh wait... Never mind!

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  5. Lol. Just tossing them aide, "You never collected comics? Outta my way!" And rush through them like Brock Lesnar...

    Lol low blow my good friend. How would you feel if you woke up, saw that X-Man was really a red head, Prof. X shot him in the leg then locked him in the holding cells... Exactly! Lol

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  6. Hmm, you know, if Prof. X did shoot X-Man in the leg, I have to say, I'd be kind of surprised... If nothing else, I could honestly say that I never saw that coming!

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  7. Hm... I gotta give you that one. So seeing as how Deadpool has his thing with Cable and he's basically another dimesnion's version of X-Man or whatever has X ever run into Deadpool?

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  8. Nope, not ever. There was one time when Marvel got my hopes up during the Cable/Deadpool series, when Deadpool and X-Man were on the cover, but it was actually Deadpool and a de-aged Cable on that cover. That's the closest I've ever come to a DP/Nate meeting.

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  9. Hm... that sucks. So does a De-aged Cable act like X-Man or is he still just Cable looking like X-Man?

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  10. Nah, he was just Cable looking like X-Man. The funny thing though was the fact that after that issue there were actually a few letters in the letters page for Cable/Deadpool where people were asking for Nate to be brought back. That surprised me, since I'd always figured I was the lone X-Man fan!

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  11. I'm shocked that I literally had never heard of X-Man until I found out about your site. Was I under a rock or is X-Man just not as heavily promoted as other Marvel people?

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  12. X-Man was never a really high profile character. That's probably what drew me to him, because as I've said numerous times before, I do like c-list Marvel heroes... I'd take Ricochet or Darkhawk over Cyclops or Spider-Man any day!

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  13. I've never heard of either of those two guys... like ever. What are they from, like groups or do they have their own comics?

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  14. HA! See, when I say I like obscure characters, I really mean it! Darkhawk had a solo title that ran for 50 issues from the early to mid-90's. You'll actually see some stuff from his series this week, because he has two storylines with Venom.

    As for Ricochet, he was on a VERY short-lived team called the Slingers that ran for(maybe)12 issues during the mid to late 90's. Yep, I'm just an encyclopedia of useless comic book knowledge!

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  15. Wow, I was completely unaware of these dudes. If we combined our comic knowledge, our wrestling knowledge and um... Donald Trump's money we could rule the world. :P

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  16. HA!!! You literally made me laugh out loud with that last line, JT! Forget about the other stuff, I think we could probably go a long way in ruling the world if we simply had Trump's money!

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  17. Lol I had to put it last to make it seem like the most unimportant. First step of comedy :P Lol but yeah I think Trump's money would help. If I Trump gave you 2 million and said you couldn't spend it on anything comic-related or anything stable like a house or a car what would it be?

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  18. Jeez Trump, what gives? He's not exactly leaving me with a lot of options! Hmm, I guess i'd give most of it to my family with the understanding that they'd give some of it back to me... See, that way the money wouldn't be coming from Trump, it would be coming from my family, so I wouldn't have to follow his crazy rules! ;-)

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  19. Lol I threw in the house and car because I knew you'd by them for ya folks so nice way of getting around my rule. Okay you had to SPEND it all within 24 hours or you'd get none. :P

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  20. Mmm, the 24 hour rule makes it UBER-tough... Jeez, is it even possible to spend 2 mil in 24 hours, without buying big ticket items like a house or car... Hmm, I'd buy a whole mess of stocks! How about that? That works... I think...

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  21. Lol I'll give you that. Just for messing with you purposes, stock in what companies?

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  22. Warner Brothers and Disney of course! :p

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  23. Lol damn it, your answer is air-tight. You win this round X... you win THIS round.

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